The 100-day magic wand
Kapil Sibal, the new HRD minister has an ambitious agenda ready for the next three months.

By Meha Mathur
New Delhi, June 25: Much of what the new Union HRD minister Kapil Sibal said at a press conference today has been on the agenda of the UPA government during the last five years. Many of these issues have been debated before. Some of these are revolutionary proposals, primarily coming from Yashpal Committee Report and recommendations of the National Knowledge Commission, which, if implemented, would change the face of Indian education. Sibal has now taken upon himself the task of evolving consensus in the next hundred days on some of these contentious issues.

School education
While introducing a bill in the current parliament session for free and compulsory education is one of the legislative initiatives, Sibal also talked of evolving consensus on Madarsa education. The thrust of a legislative move in this regard would be – there would be no intervention in religious teachings at madarsas, but candidates desirous of secular education would be provided that too, along with vocational training. The education there would be equivalent to CBSE education and would entitle a ward to gain admission to a college.

Detraumatisation of education is another priority area of the HRD minister in the next 100 days. Education can’t be traumatic, he said, and for this purpose, the ministry is planning to have marks replaced by grades in classes IX and X in CBSE affiliated schools.

He didn’t however elaborate on how grading would lessen the stress on students and their parents.

Not just that, class X would be made optional for schools and regions where class X results exams are not followed by admission to inter-college.

Ultimately, he said, there should be one single exam that should entitle a student to gain a college of his choice, rather than there being many boards.

Among the other initiatives he listed for school education, accreditation policy and creation of an independent accreditation agency, possibly CBSE, is one measure. Involvement of private players in education, through various forms of PPP, was another initiative he discussed.

Higher education
A crucial legislative measure that Sibal pointed out was the creation of an overarching autonomous authority for higher education and research, based on recommendations of Yashpal Committee Report and the National Knowledge Commission. This authority would subsume within it entities like UGC, AICTE and Medical Council.

He assured the gathering that this body would not be necessarily part of the HRD ministry and hence would not be bureaucratic. Again, Sibal did not elaborate how this overarching body would help higher education – will it help universities upgrade syllabus and in what ways will it improve quality of teaching and research.

The two issues which have been the talking point in media for the last few weeks – malpractices in deemed universities and entry of foreign education institutes were also taken up. Sibal said there would be law to prevent, prohibit and punish malpractices. There would be mandatory assessment through an independent regulatory authority and entry barriers would be strict. But then, he added, once a private player keen to start a university clears that barrier, then he can start a university, it won’t be called a deemed university.

At the same time, talking about foreign universities bill, he said, “Why should best institutes not come to India?” But he again ducked the question as to whether these institutes would be legally bound to follow reservation framework of India.

Other key initiatives
Sibal announced a whole host of other legislative and policy initiatives in school and higher education. Key among these are:

• A scheme of interest subsidy on education loans taken for professional courses taken for professional courses taken by economically weaker sections.
  
• Equal opportunity office to be created in all universities for effective implementation of schemes for disadvantaged sections of society.
  
• A new policy on distance learning would be formulated.
  
• Model degree colleges would be established in 100 districts with significant population of weaker sections and minorities.
  
• 100 women’s hostels in higher education institutions located in districts with significant population of weaker sections and minorities.
  
• Credit system to be introduced which would allow flexibility to a student to pursue a course of his choice.
  
• Five thousand colleges/universities to be provided broadband connectivity
  
• Assistance to states to establish at least 100 new polytechnics in districts without any polytechnic at present.
  
• Operationalising 700 revamped community polytechnics for skill development of rural youth.
  
• Direct credit of scholarship into bank account of 41,000 boys and equal number of girls every year, under the merit scholarship scheme.

These suggestions, if they see the light of the day as action, could bring about major changes in education in India. But to create a consensus on some of the contentious issues in 100 days is being ambitious indeed.